Extra

A Richmond man was sentenced today to 50 years to life in state prison for the shooting death of 23-year-old Wayne Drummond of Oakland near the University of California, Berkeley campus three years ago.

Nicholas Beaudreaux, 23, was convicted July 7 of first-degree murder and attempted second-degree robbery for the Sept. 4, 2006, incident that claimed the life of Drummond.

Prosecutor Tim Wellman told jurors in his closing argument in the case that the incident began shortly after midnight on Sept. 4, 2006, when Drummond got into a confrontation with Crowder outside Blakes on Telegraph at 2367 Telegraph Ave.

Drummond, who grew up in Southern California but attended a junior college in the Bay Area, and Crowder had been friends but their relationship had soured in the weeks before the shooting, according to Wellman.

Wellman said that for reasons that haven’t been made clear, Beaudreaux, who has known Crowder since they were in middle school together but didn’t know Drummond, injected himself into the confrontation and told Drummond, “I don’t know how to fight, but I know how to use this metal in my waist.”

Witnesses testified that Beaudreaux then pulled out a gun, stuck it into Drummond’s neck and demanded Drummond’s wallet, Wellman said.

Beaudreaux then shot Drummond while the two men struggled over control of the gun, according to Wellman.

Wellman said Drummond’s friends and a Berkeley police officer who arrived a few moments later attended to Drummond while he was lying on a sidewalk but they didn’t take him to the hospital because they didn’t realize that he had had been shot since they didn’t see any blood.

Instead, Drummond’s friends drove him to a friend’s room at the Alpha Omicron Pi sorority at 2311 Prospect St., near the UC Berkeley campus, where he collapsed and died shortly after 2:30 a.m.

Beaudreaux and Crowder weren’t arrested until February 2008 because it took authorities a long time to develop sufficient evidence in the case.

Crowder also was charged with murder in connection with Drummond’s death, as Berkeley police said they believed that he had directed Beaudreaux to shoot Drummond.

But prosecutors allowed Crowder to plead guilty to the lesser charge of voluntary manslaughter on June 15 in exchange for his testimony against Beaudreaux.

On July 21, Alameda County Superior Court Judge C. Don Clay, who sentenced Beaudreaux today, placed Crowder on five years’ probation and released him from jail after he served only 18 months.